How do you keep Glue and chemicals at an appropriate temp year round - open shop....

H

Hipplewm

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Joined
Dec 17, 2023
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146
Location
Charleston, SC area
So, I live in coastal SC and I have a 48x60 barn that is my woodshop - but no insulation, no AC and no heat
I currently bring my glue and if I have something else iffy into the house and put in my office and cart them back and forth. I can't even calculate the amount of glue i wasted by it getting too hot or too cold.
To give an idea, today my shop will get down to 20ish F (adnormally cold for us - but routinely in the low 30's at night for 3-4 weeks of "Winter" Summer, it isn't abnormal for the soffit vents to kick on at 140F - general barn temps will be 125ish
I can keep things warm extremely easy - old fridge and a 60w light bulb - bam - year round warmer....
How do you keep stuff cool and more importantly how do you keep them warm and cool - preferably in the same apparatus....
 
When I worked doing exterior work for a large community I always had to touch up exterior paint, and they had numerous color schemes, I ended up building a large "cooler" out of the 2 inch pink foam, using duct tape for the corners. For the heat I used one of the large bottles of water (5 gallon or so) that you get for water coolers, had that filled up to the bottom of the neck, and then dropped in a 600 watt unbreakable aquarium heater. Semi sealed the top of that to slow down evaporation, and then shut it and plugged it in. It worked really well when I set the the temp to 72 degrees. Nothing overheated, and just like a freezer, once the mass of the contents reached the desired temp it basically just cruised. Even a three day power outage in winter didn't allow stuff to freeze.

Peter
 
peter halle said:
When I worked doing exterior work for a large community I always had to touch up exterior paint, and they had numerous color schemes, I ended up building a large "cooler" out of the 2 inch pink foam, using duct tape for the corners. For the heat I used one of the large bottles of water (5 gallon or so) that you get for water coolers, had that filled up to the bottom of the neck, and then dropped in a 600 watt unbreakable aquarium heater. Semi sealed the top of that to slow down evaporation, and then shut it and plugged it in. It worked really well when I set the the temp to 72 degrees. Nothing overheated, and just like a freezer, once the mass of the contents reached the desired temp it basically just cruised. Even a three day power outage in winter didn't allow stuff to freeze.

Peter
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yeah, that is the easy one and I have an old fridge - that is probably what i am going to use - it is mainly the keeping it from boiling in summer when it is 125F + and 95% humidity.... :) Winter last 3-4 weeks, summer lasts 5-6 months....

There just doesn't seem to be an equivalent of a light bulb in a hot box for summer....
I was thinking maybe wine cooler type thing, but I don't know what temp wine is stored at....
 
I have a basement shop. Even now, with nights in the minus 0 F temps, my shop is still above 63 degrees.

In the summer, it gets to the mid 70s. So I don’t share those concerns.

No easy answers if you don’t have a basement, but perhaps a “super-insulated vault” would mitigate the problem. You could make the entire room out of expanded foam insulation panels. Instead of one panel per wall, 3 or 4. It won’t accomplish what a basement does, because it does not have all that mass of soil to temper the heat/cold, but it should help.
 
Michael Kellough said:
Agree with Packard, since you have so much space build a walk-in version of Peter’s vault next to an exterior wall. Then you can add a small air conditioner. Maybe a portable ac would work here. This is a good time of year to get a low price on a used ac.
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Of course, basements are the early geothermal structures and a super insulated vault will get hot eventually (or cold).

I’m not even sure what the acceptable temperature range is for storing glue, paint, caulk, etc. it is probably useful to establish a temperature range for storage.

I recently got an aerosol clear finish for making whiteboards. It lists an application temperature (for the board and paint) of 77 degrees F, much warmer than any other finish I’ve come across. Of course that is not storage temperature, but an outlier.

But what would be a good working range of temperature?
 
Packard said:
Of course, basements are the early geothermal structures and a super insulated vault will get hot eventually (or cold).

I’m not even sure what the acceptable temperature range is for storing glue, paint, caulk, etc. it is probably useful to establish a temperature range for storage.

I recently got an aerosol clear finish for making whiteboards. It lists an application temperature (for the board and paint) of 77 degrees F, much warmer than any other finish I’ve come across. Of course that is not storage temperature, but an outlier.

But what would be a good working range of temperature?
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The problem with basements is I am coastal, right on Atlantic ocean - if we dig down more than about 2 feet, we hit water. So much so all of our houses are on stilts and our "Basements" are the ground floor - which you can't do much with because anytime there is a decent hurricane that area is flooded.

This may force me to make a small office, insulate it and put in a mini split.....don't tell my wife though.....
 
Hipplewm said:
The problem with basements is I am coastal, right on Atlantic ocean - if we dig down more than about 2 feet, we hit water. So much so all of our houses are on stilts and our "Basements" are the ground floor - which you can't do much with because anytime there is a decent hurricane that area is flooded.

This may force me to make a small office, insulate it and put in a mini split.....don't tell my wife though.....
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A 5,000 BTU room a.c. Costs less and can easily cool a storage room.
 
Yeah, right now it is a barn - the only room is a bathroom, so I am building whatever - we do have a camper in there and when we are in the barn we use the portable AC units because they are quiet and no water dripping, so I have 2 of those to repurpose.
 
Where I am it gets pretty cold. Not usually as cold as right now but pretty darn cold. Usually my garage slab holds the temp around 35-40F. Last winter, I didn't bother. Just left everything in the garage - no real issues.

Earlier this year, I started keeping my finishes and adhesives in systainers. One for each. A couple weeks ago, when I saw that we were going to start dipping down, I brought those Systainers into the house. When it gets a little warmer, I'll bring them back into the garage. It never gets hotter than maybe 90 during the worst part of summer here.
 
Hipplewm said:
Yeah, right now it is a barn - the only room is a bathroom, so I am building whatever - we do have a camper in there and when we are in the barn we use the portable AC units because they are quiet and no water dripping, so I have 2 of those to repurpose.
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An oil-filled electric heater will keep a very well insulated storage room, and will likely only cycle on infrequently. A 10’ x 10’ room, well insulated will be simple to temperature control.

Amazon lists several of those heaters for under $80.00.

The operative term is “well-insulated”.
 
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